In general, when you critique someone's decision making, you need to assess it at the point in time the decision was actually made, not after you know what happens. Making DA and assuming Effort doesn't scout it and blindly goes mutas, yes, would have ended the game with a clean shot.

When Rain could have made a DA, you don't really know if Effort will go back into lurkers, where making a DA would be a critical mistake since it would cost you roughly 4 storms. Rain opted to forgo defending and playing the long game in exchange for building up to one knockout punch, given that Effort spent so much money on mutas and drops where his infrastructure was likely fragile. Further, making a DA or any more anti-air would have prompted Effort to not go mutas at all. There is also a decent chance that with HT only, mutas can get caught in a nasty storm and end up not doing much damage, but Effort's micro was brilliant that game.

When I assess Rain's decision at that point in time, I don't think it was a terrible one, though maybe not the best. He definitely made a number of mistakes but I really credit that to Effort with his drop play and mutas, splitting Rain's army and leaving it vulnerable to be picked off in pieces rather than consolidated in a Protoss death ball.

EffOrt will have to play amazingly to beat Last and as for Action, Shuttle is no slouch and whoever wins from the Flash/Mini is going to be tough. Zerg fans better hold out hope that either EffOrt beats Last or Action somehow makes it happen otherwise no Zerg champion this season!

Former BW EiC"Watch Bakemonogatari or I will kill you." -Toad, April 18th, 2017

On October 10 2018 04:14 BigFan wrote:EffOrt will have to play amazingly to beat Last and as for Action, Shuttle is no slouch and whoever wins from the Flash/Mini is going to be tough. Zerg fans better hold out hope that either EffOrt beats Last or Action somehow makes it happen otherwise no Zerg champion this season!

To be honest, I don't see how anyone outside of Rain could be considered as a 'contender' out of all the remaining players besides Flash.

Effort has a chance, but I doubt he will out-macro Flash.

That's not to say that Last for example couldn't push Flash, but he won't win. Same with Effort.

I have to say that Last looks genuinely more scary in TvZ than Flash lately. It's a relatively small sample size, really, but with Last not steaming, it's the best we have. The way he destroyed both Soulkey and JD (and the single game Vs Soulkey in the Ro24 especially) makes the upcoming match against Effort a must watch.

Effort's got the hardest bracket out of anyone unfortunately, having to go against ASL5 Champion, then KSL Champion, then the ASL2-4 Champion in Flash.

The odds are stacked against him due to the bracket, but he does have a very real chance of winning this thing. The last time he had the opportunity to play in a BO5 in an actual tournament that I could remember, he 3-1'd Flash, and 4-1'd him if you include the earlier round. But since then, his results vs. Flash in sponsored matches have been quite poor, so I'm excited to see if he'll have something in store for us for Terrans at least against Last. Definitely rooting for him!

What the FUCK is Protoss supposed to do better on Game 1 Circuit Breakers or Autobahn game 3? I'm so fucking close to quitting watching SC1 with how SHITTY PvZ is. Hydra busts/fake hydra busts into 9 hatch is so fucking stupid

On October 10 2018 07:08 ShowTheLights wrote:What the FUCK is Protoss supposed to do better on Game 1 Circuit Breakers or Autobahn game 3? I'm so fucking close to quitting watching SC1 with how SHITTY PvZ is. Hydra busts/fake hydra busts into 9 hatch is so fucking stupid

Please fucking tell me bc its been like this for over 2 years

Honestly not much. I think this is the main reason that makes PvZ more unfair in comparison with all other matches. There is this fairly big phase in the beginning where zergs can do many things offensively, without being in danger, while protosses can only static defend, many times blindly and when zergs' shit works, it kills the protoss, but when it does not work, the game continue on 50/50 basis (minus the cases where zergs over-committed for no reason, but this is still due to the zerg's actions, not related to what protoss is doing). However, I dont see how this can be changed. In all other match ups each race has a unit or simple combo that can react to anything the opponent sends based on micro. In TvP, protoss has dragoons that can hold anything early game, terran has tanks/vultures to hold the protoss. In TvZ terran has this universal M&M composition that can react to anything the zerg sends and zerg has mutas that can deal with every terran thing based on micro, however, in PvZ for protoss this unit is the cannon, protoss race just does not have a unit that can face all things that zergs can send, protoss has to have specific answer for each zerg strat and if it doesnt, protoss just dies. Actually the psi storm is that thing, but it comes too slow.

Ggs, if effort didn’t force feed rain with that drop on neo transistor he probably could have won that game as well. I like rain as a player and you can really see his sc2 mindset with great macro mechanics but unable to protect temps without the right unit mix. Game 1 was one of the best games I’ve seen all tournament looking forward to efforts probable matchup vs last or a zvz series vs action.

On October 10 2018 07:08 ShowTheLights wrote:What the FUCK is Protoss supposed to do better on Game 1 Circuit Breakers or Autobahn game 3? I'm so fucking close to quitting watching SC1 with how SHITTY PvZ is. Hydra busts/fake hydra busts into 9 hatch is so fucking stupid

Please fucking tell me bc its been like this for over 2 years

What Bonyth said about the Autobahn map is true. It has a big design flaw with the destructibles being too low on HP.About Circuit Breaker: Rain played an unusual two forge strategy that was perfectly countered by Effort, and Rain's macro was sloppy. There's not much else to be said about that game, it just didn't work out.Also, Effort is a beast in ZvP. People have to play incredibly well to beat him and to me it didn't look like Rain was up to par.

I'd say ZvP is still perfectly playable, no reason to worry.

If you want to do the right thing, 80% of your job is done if you don't do the wrong thing.

Rain's elimination in KSL and now here does major damage to his credibility. It helps solidify that protoss maps and the PvP match really helped him get his ASL victory. I'm not arguing Rain isn't good or wasn't deserving his championship, but he is showing that he isn't quite the whole package we were all hoping he was.

Theorycrafting PvZ (mods, please remove if inappropriate): what if hydra upgrades were moved to lair tech? Has always felt like the obvious solution to me, I'm guessing there's a reason it hasn't been brought up.

No bisu, no jangbi, Stork's current state... Let's hope Mini and Shuttle step it up. We still had 3/8 protoss in top 8 which is good.

As far as theory goes, I think they just might need to adjust for the current Protoss talent pool by using maps that favor protoss a bit more in tournaments.

It would be much better than doing very very protoss favored maps in 1 tournament to give protoss a token win because they haven't been winning, and then returning to standard (or even unfavorable) maps.

On October 10 2018 10:00 errol1001 wrote:No bisu, no jangbi, Stork's current state... Let's hope Mini and Shuttle step it up. We still had 3/8 protoss in top 8 which is good.

As far as theory goes, I think they just might need to adjust for the current Protoss talent pool by using maps that favor protoss a bit more in tournaments.

It would be much better than doing very very protoss favored maps in 1 tournament to give protoss a token win because they haven't been winning, and then returning to standard (or even unfavorable) maps.

A protoss player has made it to the top 4 of every major tournament for the past 4 years. There is no shortage of protoss players within shot of winning a championship. Perhaps a slight tweaking to the map pool could help, but the bigger issue is the failure for any protoss to stay consistent. Bisu, Shuttle, Rain, and Free have been the major players over the years and it's their individual weaknesses that stop them every time.

On October 10 2018 07:08 ShowTheLights wrote:What the FUCK is Protoss supposed to do better on Game 1 Circuit Breakers or Autobahn game 3? I'm so fucking close to quitting watching SC1 with how SHITTY PvZ is. Hydra busts/fake hydra busts into 9 hatch is so fucking stupid

Please fucking tell me bc its been like this for over 2 years

Erm game 1 Rain straight up got out macro'ed. He let Effort drone up and get bases for free and screwed up on his own macro. The caster pointed out various times in the game where Rain floats almost 2k minerals and only had 6 gates. Meanwhile Effort was on 9 hatches and his minerals barely hit 500. It was a standard game on a standard map, Rain got outplayed simple as that.

Game 2 Rain would have held if his storm finished 10s earlier. It was just good timing by Effort but yeah the map could use some tweaks.